SeducetheFlame Read Online Free PDF

now, Clarissa. You’ll drown Vince.”
    The whirlpool surrounded her mind, lulling it with white
static and blocking the yelling and screaming. It had never had this kind of
freedom before and it grew greedy, sucking in the early evening dew settling on
the grass. A wisp of cloud joined the coming tide.
    A zap shuddered through her and she buckled.
    The water splashed around her and buoyed her gently to float
on the surface as the lacerating pain sundered her. She grew lethargic and
desperately thirsty. The agony drew away and her head and spine thumped to the
floor.
    Words formed as if wasps swarmed in her head. There were
people here. But she couldn’t quite understand what had happened, where she
was, or why she lay on the floor. She was on the floor, wasn’t she?
    “Thank you, Astrid,” said a man. His voice. It was one she
always sought. She knew him, but he spoke to someone else. There was someone
else here. The syphon. She’d taken some of her powers. That’s why she felt weak
and disoriented.
    Clarissa tried to open her eyes and speak but her head swam.
She took a deep breath and held it, trying to clear her mind.
    “I’m going to check on Vince. Keep an eye on her. If she
doesn’t come around in a few minutes, call me,” Astrid answered and Clarissa
was sure she left. She was alone with the man but she couldn’t quite make
herself snap out of the fog.
    “Wake up, Clarissa,” the voice soothed.
    She struggled to open her eyes to see him. She wanted him to
touch her, and like he understood her wishes, he complied. Large hands rubbed
her shoulders and back. The heat she’d missed, returned. Ray. Always, Ray.
    “Kiss me,” she whispered.
    A long pause answered.
    Ray groaned. Lips brushed hers gently. Feathering over her
maddeningly. The mouth pressed hers a bit more and the contact became
insistent. Heat invaded her. Liquid undulated through her body and concentrated
in her core. The kiss consumed her. His tongue delved between her lips and
sipped at her. The flick of the end of his tongue teased over her teeth. He
sank inside, tasting and inflaming.
    The bubbling of boiling water surrounded her and a moan
vibrated from deep within.
    She turned her head to gasp and the heat seared against her
skin. Murmuring as her lips sought his again, she complained, “Hot.”
    “Damn it.” The weight left her body and she forced her eyes
to open.
    Ray knelt next to her and ran a hand over his face. His head
dropped back and he let out a long exhalation. With a lingering glance, she
reveled in his handsome features rigid with passion and the straight, perfect
line of his suit completely ruined by the jutting of an erection pushing the
fabric of his pants in an intriguingly large tent.
    “We could have demolished the house. Right over our heads.
It’s a wedding for Christ’s sake. And we nearly brought a catastrophe into it.
What the hell were we doing?”
    “It was just a kiss,” she slurred. Her mouth wasn’t quite
working right. She pushed herself to a sitting position. Her new, clinging,
deep-vee, red dress stuck to her skin like wet tissue paper, which it
practically was. Her nipples stood out plain as day.
    “Cover yourself,” Ray commanded hoarsely.
    “If you can’t handle looking at my body, it’s your problem.
Not mine,” she retorted.
    “We can’t be together.” His straining voice calmed to his
usual, unflappable tenor. “Look at what happened with a fight and a kiss. You
flooded the first floor of the house. I boiled the furniture in this room and
nearly cooked you with it. On top of that, the light fixtures popped and the
resulting electrical surge would’ve started a fire if I hadn’t had failsafes
installed in the house’s major systems.”
    “If you hadn’t waited so long…” She shoved up, sopping and
dripping, and pushed limp hair from her eyes. “I wouldn’t have all this
frustration built up. It wouldn’t have expanded so fast and out of my control.”
    “So you admit